As autumn sunsets cast their golden glow across Kansas, a chance to focus on what really matters

A gorgeous autumn sunset falls over the Kansas plains. (Photo by Ben Palen for Kansas Reflector)

Perhaps this native Kansan is biased, but our state’s sunsets in October are something special.

Amidst the green of newly planted wheat fields, the palette of colors from the trees getting ready for their winter naps, and the reds and bronzes of milo fields on the cusp of harvest, those sunsets set the tone. There is something about a sunset, especially so at that time of year when the seasons change, that gives cause for reflection. I have had the opportunities to see the sunsets of autumn all the way from the skyscrapers in New York to the deserts of Saudi Arabia, and while they were sometimes glorious, nothing matches those in Kansas.

For me, October is the month for breathtaking Kansas sunsets. That may be even more so in my case because it is the month of my birth, and the month of my mother’s passing. The memories come flooding back, and emotional moments are recalled.

I will always remember a comment that my mother made to me during one of our regular Sunday afternoon phone calls when I had gone on to Chicago to begin law school. She said that, while the sunset marked the end of another day when I would not be home, it gave her hope that I would return in the following days — at least to visit. That I did, along with helping during wheat harvest for years thereafter. Somewhere tucked away in a dust-covered box of old photographs, many of which are now weathered, is one she took years ago of the sunset near dusk on an October day.

I kept that at my desk for years after I moved to Chicago and then to New York.

One constant about the Kansas sunsets is that they seem to stretch to the horizon, and then some. Some may see only a barren landscape in the vastness of, say, western Kansas, but there is a quiet beauty, and the sunsets magnify that beauty. You just have to stop, listen, look around, and reflect. The reflections that come to mind from those Kansas sunsets run the gamut from heartache to triumph, and every emotion in between those two. They will stay with me for all of the days of my life.

For many of us, we have lost track of little moments that are so important in life. We are caught up in the noise of social media, the insanity and chaos of the current political environment, along with the decline in civility that seems to mark so much of today’s world. We get blinded by all of it.

We forget to pay attention to what really matters.

What does matter is that we have a limited number of days on this earth. How we live matters. We need to listen to those little voices within us that might only be heard when we find quiet moments to take the time to reflect.

A perfect point of reference for me is those Kansas sunsets. They are the calming influence, that moment in time when it is just me, my thoughts, and the vastness of the beauty that they offer. They help to provide perspective, and they remind us that the richness of life is enhanced by quiet moments, contemplating the universe with the backdrop of the Kansas sunsets on a late October afternoon.

Ben Palen is a Kansas native and a fifth-generation farmer and agriculture consultant in Colorado and Kansas. Through its opinion section, Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.